A Photographic
Journey to Pine Hill from South Berwick -- September -
October 2002By Wendy Pirsig and
Norma Keim, Old Berwick Historical Societywith assistance of
Nancy Cook, Clare Gillingham, and Terry HellerPhotographs by Wendy Pirsig and Terry Heller

This document has
two main purposes: to illustrate the historical faithfulness
with which Sarah Orne Jewett depicted the geography of her
region in her historical novel, The Tory Lover
(1901) and to show how some the areas she describes appear
more than two centuries after the era she depicts and a
century after she composed her book. Twice in the
course of the novel, Mary Hamilton takes her horse to visit
Master John Sullivan at his Pine Hill home, first in Chapter
16 to talk over Roger Wallingford's joining John Paul Jones
on the Ranger and leaving his mother exposed to an
unruly anti-Tory mob, second to seek his help in freeing
Roger from the Mill Prison at Plymouth in England.
Mary's first trip is described in enough detail that one can
retrace it two centuries later, observing what remains of
the old roads and identifying several specific sites along
the way.

Detail from the 1872 York County, Maine
Atlas.

The probable route between South
Berwick and Pine Hill in 1777-8 follows the yellow line.
This line begins at Hamilton House and ends at Pine Hill,
about 7 miles. Mary, however, would have turned left at
the Ricker house -- see next map -- to take what is now
Sullivan Street to the Master Sullivan Farm. Pine Hill
is just north of Berwick, ME today. Hamilton House is on the
southern edge of South Berwick, ME today. To the west of
the road is the Salmon Falls River, marking the border between
Maine and New Hampshire. (TH)

Detail from the 1872 York County, Maine
Atlas. (WP)

Hamilton House - East Side (TH)In Chapter 16, Mary leaves Hamilton House in
the morning.

Image by Charles H. Woodbury that appears in
the novel, showing the west side of the house, with its
terraces toward the river.

Notably absent from this image is the Lower
Landing, which was on this side of the house. The landing
included a wharf, counting house, warehouse, and other buildings
associated with trade and shipping. Behind the house on
the left appear the masts of ships, but, unless they are far
up-river, these would have to be in what Mary describes as the
field to the north and east of the house.

The Three Hills of Agamenticus -- Seen
from Garrison Hill in Dover, NH (TH)

"The fields of Berwick
were already beginning to wear that look of hand-shaped
smoothness which belongs only to long-tilled lands in an old
country."

"The northern
mountains were as blue as if it were a day in spring. They
looked as if the warm mist of April hung over them; as if they
were the outposts of another world, whose climate and cares
were of another and gentler sort, and there was no more
fretting or losing, and no more war either by land or sea."

South Berwick village is
near the horizon on the left side of this photo. We can
see that the fields of Berwick have, to a considerable extent,
returned to woods. Though not especially visible in this
photo, the woods and fields of Berwick are fairly rapidly
developing into rural/suburban residences for people who work
in the Portsmouth, NH - Boston, MA region.

Salmon Falls between South Berwick and
Rollinsford -- Looking South --as it might have appeared to Mary Hamilton
(TH)

"The road was up and down all the way over
the hills, winding and turning among the upper farms that
lay along the riverside above the Salmon Fall."

Salmon Falls -- Looking South -- about as
it appeared to Jewett (TH)with the mill in Rollinsford, NH on the
right.

Below is a view of this same mill building
from within Rollinsford (TH)

Worster Brook (WP)"There was the ford to cross at Wooster's
River...."

Looking northwest from near the crest of
Pine Hill (WP)

"The road still led
northward along the high uplands above the river; all the
northern hills and the mountains of Ossipee looked dark now, in
a solemn row."

"On the heights of the great ridge some of the
elder generation of trees were still standing, left because
they were crooked and unfit for the mastships' cargoes. They
were monarchs of the whole landscape, and waved their long
boughs in the wintry wind. Mary Hamilton had known them in her
earliest childhood, and looked toward them now with happy
recognition, as if within their hard seasoned shapes their
hearts were conscious of other existences, and affection like
her own. She stopped the fleet horse on the top of the hill,
and laid her hand upon the bark of a huge pine; then she
looked off at the lower country. The sight of it was a
challenge to adventure; a great horizon sets the boundaries of
the inner life of man wider to match itself, and something
that had bound the girl's heart too closely seemed to slip
easily away."

Facing East at Old Pine Hill Road.
(WP)

As can be seen from the sign to the right of
the picture, this farmhouse stands at the corner of Old Pine
Hill Road and Sullivan Street. It is likely that of E. and B.
Ricker marked on the Pine Hill map above. Jewett would have
turned at this corner had she visited the scene of Mary's ride
to Master Sullivan's. Someone coming from South Berwick would
have approached from the right, then turned toward the camera,
down Sullivan street.

Sites Associated with Master Sullivan

Possibly the remodeled Master John
Sullivan School House -- (WP)

One section of this
house at 134 School Street / Route 9, in Berwick is
believed to be Master John Sullivan's school, which was moved from its
original location -- see Pine Hill map, above and
the news clipping to the right.
This view was taken from Old Pine Hill Road looking
at the present rear of the house. The next photo was
taken from School Street (Rte 9), showing the front
of the house with a wide lawn. We can see that the
house is made up of two or three smaller buildings.
This house was identified by Clare Gillingham and
Nancy Cook. The residents at the time of these
photos were named Pineo.

View of possible
Sullivan school house from Old Pine Hill Road,
looking southward. (WP)

From an unidentified newspaper
after 1945.

Photograph of the house believed to be Sullivan's school
moved and remodeled. This is the photograph
referred to in the above newspaper clipping.

This marker indicates the location of the
original Master John Sullivan farm site in Berwick, near the
actual hill called Pine Hill. The marker stands at the
fork formed by Sullivan Street and Pine Hill Road (not Old
Pine Hill Road). We are looking north, up Pine Hill. Sullivan
Street is the road to the right. Winslow Street and the
original location of the family burying plot are off Sullivan
St., out of view to the right. It may be helpful to note
that in the 1770s, what is now South Berwick was known as
Berwick village, and at least part of what is now known as
Berwick, was then Pine Hill. Therefore, though the
Sullivans lived at Pine Hill, they did not necessarily
reside on Pine Hill. Next is a close-up of the
plaque on the marker. (WP)

House Currently at the Sullivan Farm Site
(WP)

Looking north along Sullivan Street from below the
marker shown above, which stands at the evergreen tree in the
background toward the left. The beautiful early 19th century
house in the foreground is Goodwin Insurance. It is shown
as part of a tannery complex on the Berwick map of 1872 (Pine
Hill map above).

Approximate Site of School House No. 3 --
See maps. (WP)

The actual location of Master Sullivan's school is
not known; this is a possible location, though it is up the hill
from his farm. The above news clipping
indicates the school originally stood on
Worcester / Worster Brook, which would be some distance south of the
Sullivan farm. Note
that the home in the photograph
is not the 19th-century building marked as School House
No. 3 on the maps above.